Ty Storey ran, then passed Charleston to its second consecutive state championship.
Storey threw a 4-yard touchdown pass to senior wide receiver Taylor King with 17 seconds left and Charleston batted down Smackover's last-play Hail Mary to hold on for a 33-26 victory Friday night in the Class 3A state championship game at War Memorial Stadium in Little Rock.
Storey, a senior quarterback who has orally committed to the University of Arkansas, accounted for all five Charleston touchdowns. He completed 24 of 38 passes for 218 yards and 3 touchdowns and rushed 35 times for 153 yards and 2 touchdowns. Storey either passed or carried the ball on 73 of Charleston's 79 plays.
On the Tigers' final drive, which went 65 yards in 10 plays, Storey ran the ball nine consecutive times before throwing his only pass, a 4-yarder to King on a roll-out pass to the right corner of the end zone.
"We said if we're going to win this thing, we're going to win it in your hands," Charleston Coach Greg Kendrick said of Storey. "If we were going to lose this thing, we were going to lose it in his hands. Big-time players make big plays in big games.
"There's no other player bigger in the state than him right now. I will go to say, in my book, that there isn't a player in the state in a long time that's bigger than him."
Storey finished his career with 154 touchdowns passes, second-most by an Arkansas high school quarterback, 17 behind Rhett Lashlee of Shiloh Christian, who threw 171 in 1999-2001. Storey passed for 12,860 yards, third-best in the state behind Pulaski Academy's Stefan Loucks (13,703 in 2003-2006) and Lashlee (13,201).
The Tigers (14-0), the 4-3A champions who have won 29 consecutive games, repeated as Class 3A state champions, also winning in 2013 against Glen Rose. They earned their fifth state championship as recognized by the Arkansas Activities Association. The Tigers won in 2005, 2008 and 2011 in addition to last year and this year.
"We can take a deep breath and relax now," said Kendrick, who has not lost a game as a head coach since taking over for Doug Loughridge, who is now at Alma. "For this program, it's huge."
Charleston's game-winning drive was set up by Smackover running back Willie Manning's fumble, which was recovered by King at the Charleston 45 with 4:55 remaining and the game tied at 26-26.
It was Storey time after that.
The quarterback's longest run of the drive was 12 yards, which gave the Tigers a first down at the Smackover 16. Three plays later, Storey's 3-yard run on third-and-2 gave the Tigers first-and-goal at the Buckaroos 5.
"They caught us," Smackover Coach Brian Strickland said. "We could not slow down the run there on the last drive. We fell asleep there on that last play."
Smackover gave itself a chance to tie in the final 17 seconds.
Michael Edwards returned Charleston's kickoff to the Smackover 38, setting up Logan Clark's 28-yard pass play to Jordan Jones with :04 to play.
The Buckaroos had time for one final pass from the Charleston 34, and it nearly resulted in a touchdown. Clark's Hail Mary was headed in the direction of Elmo Hempstead and Jones when it was knocked down by Jake Kuykendall.
Jones, a junior who has orally committed to Arkansas, led Smackover with 4 catches for 137 yards, including a 77-yard touchdown. Hempstead caught 5 passes for 80 yards, including a 31-yard touchdown.
King caught 13 passes for 101 yards and 3 touchdowns. Senior wide receiver Dylan Jones had 5 catches for 66 yards for the Tigers, who outgained the Buckaroos 388-327 and held the ball nearly 16 minutes longer.
Charleston trailed 20-13 at halftime but pulled to within 20-19 on Storey's 3-yard pass to King with 5:49 left in the third quarter. Dylan Lenihan's extra-point attempt failed.
Smackover extended its lead to 26-19 at the 4:27 mark of the third quarter on Clark's 31-yard touchdown pass to Hempstead.
But Charleston drove 73 yards in 12 plays to tie the game at 26-26 with 32 seconds left in the quarter on Storey's 2-yard run. The drive was extended by Jordan Jones' unsportsmanlike conduct penalty on third-and-12 from the Smackover 49.
Clark completed 12 of 18 passes for 235 yards and 3 touchdowns for Smackover (13-2), the 6-3A champions. He threw a 77-yard touchdown pass to Jones and a 14-yard touchdown pass to Jackson Martin in the first half.
Sports on 12/13/2014